I've made the switch to immersion waxing + eventual drip this past Summer. I use the Silca system, after learning about the Wippermann wax line.

There's (hopefully) no going back. Much cleaner and strong indication that the drivetrain's expected life is quadrupled.

Now, waxing is perhaps more suited to commuting (high mileage, easy access to waxing paraphernalia) than touring. My plan for next trip is to carry a second chain (expected to last 800kms between immersion baths) and to apply drip wax (200-300kms per application). Nightmare scenario is consecutive days of heavy rain, but it never really happened to me before, so perhaps not a deal breaker.

If anyone has experience with this setup, I'll read with interest.

57 pages of fun.

Immersive waxing / it should be more popular

waxed my chain first time two month ago. REX wax. did now 760km and the chain still runs smooth! no way back to chain oil ....

I'm not a high mileage rider or particularly fast, I simply want my chains and drive bits to stay clean and functional. Been using Silca's system on my bike chains this last year, quite comfortable with the results.

Do you feel your chains run any noisier when waxed vs. standard lube ? I ask this as a friend of mine made that comment after switching over.

Quieter. This summer, I'd swap chains at the 500 kms mark, more or less. Silent to the end. Now on a trainer. Not a peep.

for a longer trip one can mount a fresh waxed chain at start, and when the chain does not run smooth anymore use liquid wax to the end of the trip.
second chain too heavy

In 2014 when I rode Pacific Coast, my riding partner started with a waxed chain that he waxed at home with paraffin wax. It was quite noisy after several hundred miles. We did 863 miles (Astoria to San Francisco), but I remember his chain as being very noisy several hundred miles before the end. That was over a decade ago, I can't say when it really started getting noticeably noisy.

Given Gauvins experience cited above with a quiet chain at 500 km, that suggests that the type of wax used could make a big difference. Gauvin's quiet chain differs quite a bit from my friend's experience with paraffin.

I am sticking with a conventional wax based lube that I add to my chain when it gets noisy. I pack much heavier than Gauvins on a bike tour, but I would not carry a spare chain on a tour. That comment surprised me. I carry a spare quick link or two, plus a couple extra chain links, that is all.

I tried waxing a gazillion years ago and it was just "meh" and have never had the urge to go through all the hassle again.
I'm open to new things though, and I imagine the was recipes have improved a lot.

Oh, I too have a pretty clear recollection of chain noise being annoying---but again, am aware that products improve and the wax type lube might take care of the noise issue.
Spare chains are heavy buggers and certainly wouldnt want to carry one unless I was on some super long, isolated long trip where I could not access a bike store.

Tourist in MSN There's a recent Cycling About post with detailed information on wax systems. Interesting read. For a deep dive into waxing, Zero Friction Cycle is perhaps the best. No doubt that recent systems are much more efficient/durable than the parrafin you find at the corner store.

Tourist in MSN str I took to the habit of carrying a second chain (a Wipperman sx10 - 226g) years ago. A typical trip, back then, would push wear close to the 5% mark, beyond which there's potential damage to the cassette (and perhaps even chainrings). Perhaps excessive with wet lube, but from what I read, wax systems do not work well in wet condition.

The typical advice is to re-wax ASAP. Drip wax takes a long time to settle (i.e for the carrier to evaporate), so if it keeps raining all night, your chain is compromised. Options then are to carry a wet lube, and contaminate your drive train, or swap a waxed spare and hope that rain will eventually stop.

At this point, I don't know what's best.

I prefer waxing as I believe a waxed chain is more quiet.
I too use Silca wax.
My chains, pre wax time, were always quiet though that is because I take very good care of my kit and cleaned/lubed my chain weekly...they also lasted a lot longer because of my maintenance system.
I replace my chain monthly with a freshly waxed chain and have several in the queu ready to go.
But it is a bit of a laborious maintenance system.

In my case, probably less than with wet lube.

I happened to have 6 (not a typo, SIX) new chains. I had purchased the usual 2x10sx while in Europe, two (why not) WAX Wippermann so I'd try and avoid the annoying stage of factory lube removal, and two more 10sx in a drawer, that I had completely forgotten about. Which means that I now have 6 chains in rotation (!). i.e. close to 5 000kms + between immersion baths.

My current immersion process (chain wax soup) takes a couple of hours at the most for the whole batch. It would be faster/simpler/but-less-effective to take the drip wax route (buy Wippermann WAX and lube with Silca Super Secret). Maybe, one day. But for now I have enough wax to last till I'm done with cycling

I much prefer waxing over a razor. My legs are a lot smoother. Oh wait, sorry, wrong forum.

I assume you meant 0.5 percent. I do not wear out chains very fast at all, but I used to wear them out quite fast. I concluded it was my chain gauge. The cheap little chain guages over-estimate wear by a lot.

Zinn used to have a regular column on mechanical stuff. This was written about five years ago, the formatting appears to be scrambled a bit, but the text and some photos are still there:
https://velo.outsideonline.com/road/...ear-accurately

I bought the Pedros three tang measuring tool he recommended.

Park makes a very similar model, and here they describe how to use it. The Park one has 0.5, 0.75 and 1.0 percent measurements, where the Pedros tool only has 0.5 and 0.75 percent, so the Park might be the better one to buy.

At about 50 seconds into the video where it shows him pressing on the chain to firmly hold the chain against the two hooks (Zinn referred to the hooks as Tangs), that is a key to correct use of this checker. You do need to firmly squeeze the chain at that point for an accurate measurement.

While writing this post, I discovered that the Park tool I cited above is a newer better version. They made a CC-4 that did not have the 1.0 percent measurement.

Most of my bikes use an eight speed chain, I change them at 0.75 percent. I might have to change a chain every other year. Eight speed KMC chains are cheap enough, I do not keep track of when I change chains or how many miles I got. I think I changed a chain on one of my bikes a year ago. This year I had to replace two sprockets on my rando bike, chain started skipping on two sprockets, but I did not replace the chain. I have several new eight speed chains on the shelf, so I am good for a while.

My Rohloff bike, change at 1.0 percent which is a guess on my part since my Pedros checker won't measure that. But my Rohloff chain and sprocket teeth wear in together so I am not in a hurry to make sure I replace that on time. Some times I have replaced it at well over 1.0 percent.

***

Rain, I do not get concerned about riding with a wet chain. The water acts as a lubricant until it dries out. Then I add lube again. If I have continuously dry conditions on a tour, I might go for a week before I add lube. I add it when the drive train starts to make noise. I use Finish Line Ceramic - Dry when on a bike tour. At home I use some old wax lube that I have had for over a decade, I think it was Pedros but not 100 percent sure on that, it is now in a different bottle.

I used to use a petroleum based gear lube, the same stuff I had in my Jeep differential, synthetic SAE 90W140. But that was a dust magnet. Went to a wax based lube over a decade ago, happy I made that change.

Interesting. Gauvins also started a thread a few years ago on razor selection. I do not recall wax being part of the discussion.
Safety razor

Well, of course my post was a joke. As for actually shaving, I too use a safety razor. They work very well, and are much more economical, and give a better more comfortable shave than the multibladed monstrosities for sale today. I also use shaving soap and a brush. I use Arko shaving soap which I purchased on Amazon, 12 soap sticks for $11. I bought them in 2016 and still have yet to run out. I now have a beard, but still shave my beck daily. That has cut back on the soap use though.

I would offer this critique of Zero Friction’s testing before diving too deep. Zero Friction’s claims of 12,000+km is wildly excessive. If you dig deep enough, you’ll even find him admitting this in terms of real world testing. Check the “Single Application Longevity” testing. He says “Real world road riding vs lab testing tends to indicate that lab test claims for treatment longevity may be around double to triple vs what may be assessed in field testing.” His bench tests have problems that need to be addressed to better model real world conditions.

Not that it matters all that much. Watch the video in this thread.


I wouldn’t carry a chain because there are lots of stores to buy one if you need it.

As to the efficacy of wax in wet conditions, that is a myth perpetrated by people who don’t understand the dynamics of lubricants. Wax does not wash off in rain. If anything, it is less water soluble then oil and oil isn’t soluble at all. What wax doesn’t do is flow. It can be pushed out of place by pressure but it doesn’t flow back. Oil does. The plates and pins of a waxed chain get starved of wax as the wax is pushed out of place but it can’t flow back. Water infiltration results in rust because there is no coverage of the bare metal and no way to replenish it. The chain starts to squeak.

With oil, the oil flows back. The water is still there and, because water is heavier than oil and has more affinity for the metal surface than oil does, it settles onto the metal surface. Corrosion occurs just like with wax but the sound of the squeak is masked by the oil. I posted this with a pretty good graphic showing how water works on an oiled surface. The water does as much damage, it’s just quieter. Oil or wax should be refreshed after rain.


Personally, I’ve ridden only solvent waxed (aka drip wax) chains for about 25 years now all over the US in every condition conceivable. I’ve never worried about the chain and just relubed after rain. You also don’t have to rewax after 100 miles (or some other ridiculous interval) with solvent wax. I did a 1500 mile tour with a brand new chain and I lubricated 3 times. I estimate that one of my intervals was close to 700 miles. On that tour, I carried a 2 oz bottle of White Lightning Clean Ride and didn’t use more than a quarter of the bottle. I carry the same bottle today and have used it on many bicycle tours. I haven’t emptied it yet on a tour and even at home it lives in my tool bag for years.

I’m currently doing a data collection on a chain on one of my bikes. I’ve currently at 1500 miles with no apparent wear and my lubrication interval runs, roughly, 450 miles.

TL;DR version: Don’t worry too much about chain lubrication. Carry solvent wax, apply it as needed, and enjoy the ride.

Wax is actually pretty fine with rain. The chain does turn rusty (on the outside), but it takes a lot of rain and riding to degrade the wax inside the chain.

There are ways to expedite and improve the drying process of water based drip waxes. Rex has a video where a hot air gun is used to heat the chain enough to melt the drip wax. If the chain is on the bike, one needs to take care not to heat the frame / ruin the paint.

People don't typically carry hot air guns on tour, but a hotel hair dryer could work, and what a lot of tourists do carry is a stove of some sort. Taking the chain off the bike after recently applied drip wax has had a chance to dry a little and running it through the flame of a stove could work to melt the drip wax and evaporate any lingering water.

I have thought of the chances of the chain catching fire with a stove and need to test it at some point, but I consider the chances of a flaming chain to be tiny to non-existent. It'd take a lot of roasting to ignite the wax on a chain.

WRT rain/rust -- from what I read (no firsthand experience), your observation is on point. My understanding is that from a lubrication standpoint, wax and oil are roughly equivalent. Rain promotes the infiltration of sand and that will impact both types of lubricants. The "reflow" superiority of oil appears to be a myth, at least according to ZFC's data. What is apparently true, however, is the marked degradation of wax in wet vs dry conditions.

WRT drip wax drying time -- this is why I plan on carrying a second chain, i.e. not to have to worry about drying,

Anyhow, I'll see.

---

Just noted that you are from Turku. Was there this summer. Really enjoyed Finland. (except, perhaps, shivering in strong headwinds closing on NordKapp, but it helps to make a memorable trip

Some of your conclusions are in error. I’ll agree that oil and wax have similar lubricity. Or, I should say, that in a bicycle chain application, they are equivalent. That said, chains don’t appear to need much in the way of lubrication anyway according to this 1999 study from John’s Hopkins. I’m not brave enough to do a test of actually running a chain without lubricant but I suspect, given the John’s Hopkins study, that lubrication doesn’t do much to increase or decrease chain longevity.

Rain promote infiltration of sand when using oil but that is because of the flow characteristics of oil. Wax, being a solid, blocks infiltration of grit so that reduces wear from grinding of sand in the chain…more on that a little later. Oil definitely “reflows” but that is the problem. As it reflows it carries microscopic particles of silica into the chain and, since silica is harder than steel, it grinds on the pressure points resulting in wear.

However, before we go crowing about the superiority of wax in keeping silica out of the chain, wax will move under pressure but it won’t flow back when the pressure is released…think of meringue in a piping bag. The wax doesn’t carry anything back with it because it doesn’t go back. However, eventually all the wax will be squeezed out and then you have metal-on-metal grinding, resulting in wear. The rate of wear with grit from sand and the rate of wear from metal-on-metal grinding are roughly the same which is why chains don’t really last any longer with wax than with oil.

The starvation of the pressure points with wax and the exposed metal are why waxed chains squeak after being exposed to rain. There is uncoated metal there which can freely rust and the rust results in a squeak because it is of a larger volume than the base metal. Oiled chains are undergoing rust as well but the sound is masked by the oil (see the post I linked to above). The wax doesn’t get “washed off” because it can’t be washed off with water. It just that there is more steel exposed so rust can form quickly.

Use an organic solvent based wax or apply a water based wax at night so that it can dry overnight. That said, water based waxes offend my chemical sensibilities. First there is the water issue. Water takes more time to evaporate that the solvent used in organic solvent wax systems. But, more importantly, in order for wax to be soluble in water, it needs some very sophisticated and powerful surfactants (soap) to change it from extremely hydrophobic (water hating) to water soluble. That surfactant doesn’t go anywhere when the water evaporates. It’s still there mixed with the wax. Apply water…from rain for example…and agitation…from the chain going around…and the surfactant will reactivate and the wax will wash off.

Organic solvent based wax systems don’t have the surfactant so the whole system stays hydrophobic and in place better. The difference in lubricity between a water based wax and a solvent based wax isn’t all that different so you aren’t losing anything…not that it matters much. I use White Lightning and have for decades. It’s good and it’s not that expensive. And my drivetrain is just as clean as hot waxed system and much, much, much cleaner than oiled chains.


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Hair dryers on low setting unlikely to damage paint. On a high setting, probably pretty safe too, but most people run a hair dryer on high for less than a minute or two, much longer than that and the hair dryer might over heat.

I wanted to get the penetrating oil into my bottom bracket shell threads so I could remove the rusty bottom bracket, set a hair dryer aimed on the bottom bracket shell on low for quite a few minutes to get things quite warm, it helped with no damage to paint.

I would never use a flame on a lubed chain for any reason. But I might be overly cautious, I spent a couple years early in my career doing fire protection research and safety research, I read thousands of accident reports where people made some pretty stupid very expensive mistakes.

Maybe. I'd tend to think that rain gets more grit on a chain because the wheel sprays a mix of water (rain) and grit (from the road surface) that is almost non-existent when the sun shines. As as far as I understand the argument, both wax and oil are equally affected by rain, due to dirty spray. Below is a screenshot of a notebookLM summary performed across ZFC's numerous documents. Note that the % refer to the % of the 0.5% target wear.

[I don't recall who suggested that ZFC was a not a great source of information. I've read the critique. Didn't really understood what was not OK -- we can always argue that a different test methodology would give different and perhaps better results....]

The wax..even drip wax…may be pushed away from the pressure points (pins inside and between the plates on the outside) but it is only pushed out of the way. The wax is still in place which blocks much of the grit getting into the chain unlike oil where the oil actually sucks the grit into the internals. The water can get past the wax because the system isn’t sealed but the water and the corrosion it causes are the reason waxed chains start to squeak shortly after water exposure.

That would be me. I was skeptical of ZFC results before I read the Hamblini piece based on his very wild claims of increased mileage for waxed chains in addition to his very silly cleaning procedure. Hamblini just confirmed what I was suspecting.

The graphic is lacking context. Are “drip lubes” waxes or oils? Are wet lubes waxes or oils? Averaging all drip lubricants and coming up with a very large number is just indicative of the variance of the test and the lubricants. It’s not really a valid number without more context. It’s analogous to saying that 400 people have an average wealth of $500,000,000 when 399 people with $30 in the bank and one person has a billion in the bank.

This is all kind of moot for a chain for touring. Even if you are cycling for months at a time, worrying about chain wear shouldn’t be that much of a concern. Ride your bike, lubricant when necessary, preferable with a solvent wax system and replace the chain when it wears out or at 3000 miles if you are really worried about it. Hot waxing is okay for at home (too tedious for me) but out on the road keep it simple.

Modern water based drip waxes aren't actually true chemical emulsions, ie. They don't use surfactants. The wax is somehow formed into tiny microscopic droplets which solidify in the carrier to form a kind of wax "dust". After application the water evaporates and the wax is held together by its own stickiness. After pressure is applied the wax squishes into a more solid form.

It's not ideal, which is why heating the chain briefly after the drip wax has had time to dry could be a good idea. It'd make the drip wax almost as good as immersion wax.

I don't know whether a hair dryer can overheat. It's working mechanism is to an extent self cooling.

I've waxed some of my fjällräven jackets with a hair dryer. It took quite some time and then at least it was fine.

Many metal bikes do use powder coat, which is baked on at 200 Celsius (around 400 fahrenheit), but if the bike has clear coat, it could be damaged by too much heat. But I doubt a hair dryer could achieve that. With a hot air gun though...

With carbon bikes I'd be extra careful if I was using a hot air gun.

And again, hot air guns aren't really relevant in terms of touring. I tried looking for small ones, but even the small pen type models are surprisingly heavy.

I understand the sentiment. On should be cautious with flames. But if one isn't going out of their way to actually set their chain on fire and is paying at least some attention to the process, just having a flame present shouldn't increase the risks measurably. Waxes and oils need to evaporate/aerosolize in order to catch fire (read: candles/diesel engines). For chain wax to evaporate enough to catch fire would take significant roasting. But even if a section did catch fire, I don't think it'd be able to heat the chain next to it enough to create a chain reaction event (pun totally intended). There also isn't a lot of fuel on a chain so any burning even wouldn't take long.
Needless to say, if one were to heat up their chain with a gas stove etc., all the typical precautions still need to be taken, ie. doing it on a inflammable ground surface, having extinguishing devices nearby (water's fine), not wearing flammable textiles while doing it etc.
It is like the saying goes: fire is a good servant but a bad master. It needs to be respected.

I once tested how well motor oil burned by placing a small metal can of it inside an old oil barrel we were using as a fire pit for parties. The barrel had holes in the bottom so the fire inside likely reached temperatures way above 1000 celsius. Hot enough to blow up asbestos...
I wasn't able to burn off the oil. It probably burned at some point but went out immediately when there wasn't enough external heat.